In order to attain a decorative effect with metallic feeling, metallic pigments such as aluminum fine powders are widely used. Further, in recent years, colored metallic pigments having various color tones are developed.
As such colored metallic pigments, a colored metallic pigment obtained by forming, on the surface of a metallic pigment, a resin film containing a coloring pigment is generally known. For example, a colored metallic pigment is known which is prepared by adding a monomer, a metallic pigment and a coloring pigment to an organic solvent in which a monomer having a double bond is soluble but a polymer (resin) obtained by polymerizing the monomer is insoluble, and then adding a polymerization initiator to the resulting mixture to polymerize the monomer, so that a resin layer containing a coloring pigment is formed on the surface of the metallic pigment. However, the colored metallic pigment obtained by this method does not attain a good gloss level and a high color saturation level.
Accordingly, as a technique for solving the problem, for example, Japanese Patent Laying-Open No. 01-315470 (PTD 1) discloses a colored metallic pigment prepared by chemisorbing a coloring pigment onto the surface of a metallic pigment through a carboxylic acid which has at least one double bond and at least two carboxyl groups and is prepared by thermally polymerizing at least one carboxylic acid having double bonds.
Further, Japanese Patent Laying-Open No. 09-124973 (PTD 2) discloses a colored metallic pigment formed by allowing a coloring pigment, which is surface-treated with an amino compound having two amino groups but no carboxyl group in each molecule, to adhere to base material particles such as aluminum flake.